SH Medical 08 - The Baby Dilemma by Jacqueline Diamond Page B

sat across the desk from Mike, but today anger flashed from her narrowed eyes. Despite the hard-set mouth, no lines disturbed the smoothness of her skin. In her midfifties, the town’s first lady kept up her guard in the battle against aging.
    “What makes you think your husband is cheating on you?” Mike asked.
    An involuntary start shook her thin frame, but failed to dislodge a single hair from the honey-colored chignon. “Why do you assume that?”
    Experience. “If I’m wrong, please correct me.”
    He half expected her to swoop to her feet and stalk out. Instead, her shoulders sagged. “The Kendalls said you were trustworthy. And that you’d be discreet.”
    “Absolutely.” He was glad one of his major clients spoke highly of him. Perhaps it had been Reese Kendall’s young wife, Persia, who’d passed the word along. In her early twenties, the exotic former executive trainee at Kendall Technologies had quickly taken her place among the cream of Safe Harbor society. “How long has the affair been going on?”
    The question seemed to startle her all over again. Most likely she’d expected to control the interview, but that wasn’t how Mike handled things.
    She recouped quickly. “Longer than most.”
    “Most?”
    “I’m not naive, Detective. Roy and I have been married nearly thirty years. He’s a good-looking man in a position of authority. Women gravitate to him.” She seemed to take pride in that fact.
    His wife must carry an image of him from thirty years ago, since the jowly Roy Hightower didn’t fit Mike’s idea of a handsome man. Yet if she was right, at least one other woman found him attractive. “He’s had affairs before?”
    “Nothing of substance.” She swallowed. “When I smelled perfume, well, I didn’t make too much of that. Then the phone calls started.”
    Mike scratched “phone calls” on a pad. While it would be more convenient to take notes in the computer, that tended to bother clients, particularly in a personal matter. “Tell me about them.”
    “A few months ago, the phone began to ring at odd hours. When I answer, there’s no one there.” She scowled.
    “Does Roy ever pick them up?”
    “If he answers the phone and starts talking to someone, how would I know if it’s the mystery caller?” she snapped.
    “I meant, has he ever mentioned hang-ups?” He adjusted his reading glasses. Not only did they help with the paperwork involved in running the agency, he’d also learned that they softened his appearance and made some clients more comfortable.
    “No. But he’s in a prominent position. Some council votes are controversial. I’m sure he’d take that sort of thing in stride.”
    He never mentioned them and you never asked. Not exactly a close relationship, Mike mused. “Did you notify the phone company?”
    Her nostrils flared. “I don’t wish to involve anyone official.”
    “Understood.” His thoughts returned to the nature of the phone calls. While a mistress would have Roy’s cell number, she might call the house if the in-box was full or the cell turned off. Or to disturb the wife, hoping to spark a confrontation and divorce. “Ever hear anyone breathing or whispering on the line?”
    “No.” Gemma folded her hands tightly. “But I did notice a pattern.”
    “What kind of pattern?”
    “If I don’t answer immediately, there are two rings and then it stops. Then one more ring and then it stops again.”
    That was strange. “Has he ever used coded signals like that with you?”
    She stared at him coldly. “Why on earth would he? Anyway, I dismissed it as someone’s idea of a prank. Then this past month, there were gifts.”
    “Someone’s sending anonymous gifts?” That didn’t fit the usual signs of an affair. Still, it might be another tactic to spark a fight and clear the path to become Wife Number Two.
    “No. I meant, my husband began giving me gifts.” The woman rattled a diamond-and-sapphire bracelet on her slim wrist.